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A Walk Around My Garden - Writing Workshop

Writing practise is always helpful. This week I've decided to join the writing workshop at 'Sleep is for the Weak', a blog which I discovered recently. I was inspired by the third prompt "A Walk Around Your Garden", and this is what I have come up with.

A Walk Around My Garden

Well, I live in a house that has a garden, but technically, it's not MY garden. We have a two storey house, which my family shares with one other family and a senior relative. In other words, my husband, my kids and I live in a house along with my husband's brother's family and my husband's mother. A nice combined family set up. But it can't last forever, can it? As the kids grow and the family's needs change, we'll have to go our separate ways. It's only natural. I plan to make the upstairs our own, and as the weather cools down as summer advances into autumn, I plan to do just that. And the garden? Yes, I'm coming to that.

The garden is attached to the downstairs and was the pride of my late father-in-law. He grew wonderfully useful plants. There was (and still is!) a lemon tree. Living in India I've come to know how useful lemons are! Does anyone know that lemon trees keep mosquitoes away? And lemonade is a wonderfully cooling drink (well, everyone knows that!). There was a neem tree (gone now!) which produces leaves which are great for keeping insects out of clothes stored up for the winter (or the summer!) months. And of course the ubiquitous tulsi plant, worshipped in Hindu homes. The tulsi is great for treating coughs and colds. You can add the leaves to tea, or chew them just like that. But don't pluck the leaves on Wednesdays and Sundays. Alas! Father-in-law knew that no-one would have the time to maintain the garden, so he had it cemented over the year before his death. Only a few plants remain, close to the walls. Thankfully, the lemon tree and tulsi plants remain.You want to know what my dream for moving upstairs is? It's to have a terrace garden in the open spaces upstairs. I'll need lots of those ceramic flowerpots. I'll have to water them a lot. I want lots of lemon trees to keep the mosquitoes away. Not to mention my very own tulsi plant.

I've visions of sitting having my morning tea in the terrace garden of my dreams when my kids have gone to school and my husband has gone to work. This can only be on winter mornings, naturally. The Indian sun is quite manageable then. And I'll write and write and write away to my heart's content. And read too, of course. This is the dream that keeps me going when I'm up to my ears in housework.

Turning our dreams into reality keeps the edge of excitement in our lives!

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